British Forum for Ethnomusicology

Review: [untitled]
Author(s): Rachel Harris
Reviewed work(s):
Folk Music of China: Living Instrumental Traditions by Stephen Jones
Source: British Journal of Ethnomusicology, Vol. 5 (1996), pp. 168-170
Published by: British Forum for Ethnomusicology
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168 British Journal
of Ethnomusicology,
vol. 5 (1996) 168 British Journal
of Ethnomusicology,
vol. 5 (1996)
choose an obvious
example,
the neutral second
degree
of modes like Arab
Bayati
and Turkish
Huseni could be seen as a microtonal "solution"
to tetrachordal
asymmetries (or,
from another
perspective,
to the tritone which would exist
between the flat second and the fifth
degrees,
or, alternatively,
between the raised second and
lowered sixth
degrees).
The use of such neutral
intervals, of course, represents
a "solution"
which is inadmissible in Hindustani music, but
which can function as a basic structural
strategy
to resolve tetrachordal imbalances in Near
Eastern modal
systems.
While current
ethnomusicological
concerns
with
accessibility
and socio-cukural contextuali-
zation are on the whole
appiopriate,
it is to be
hoped
that
they
leave room for technical
analytical
studies like
Jairazbhoy's which,
despite
their inherent
difficulty,
can contribute
so
greatly
to our
understanding
of musical form
and
history.
REFERENCES
Bor, Joep (1975) "Raga, species
and
evolution."
Sangeet
Natak Akademi 35:
1748.
van der Meer, Wim (1980) Hindustani music
in the 20th
century.
New Delhi: Allied
Publishers.
PEIb-R MANUEL
John
Jay College,
CUNY Graduate Center
plmjj@cunyvm.cuny.edu
choose an obvious
example,
the neutral second
degree
of modes like Arab
Bayati
and Turkish
Huseni could be seen as a microtonal "solution"
to tetrachordal
asymmetries (or,
from another
perspective,
to the tritone which would exist
between the flat second and the fifth
degrees,
or, alternatively,
between the raised second and
lowered sixth
degrees).
The use of such neutral
intervals, of course, represents
a "solution"
which is inadmissible in Hindustani music, but
which can function as a basic structural
strategy
to resolve tetrachordal imbalances in Near
Eastern modal
systems.
While current
ethnomusicological
concerns
with
accessibility
and socio-cukural contextuali-
zation are on the whole
appiopriate,
it is to be
hoped
that
they
leave room for technical
analytical
studies like
Jairazbhoy's which,
despite
their inherent
difficulty,
can contribute
so
greatly
to our
understanding
of musical form
and
history.
REFERENCES
Bor, Joep (1975) "Raga, species
and
evolution."
Sangeet
Natak Akademi 35:
1748.
van der Meer, Wim (1980) Hindustani music
in the 20th
century.
New Delhi: Allied
Publishers.
PEIb-R MANUEL
John
Jay College,
CUNY Graduate Center
plmjj@cunyvm.cuny.edu
STEPHEN JONES, Folk music
of
China:
living
instrumental traditions. Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1995.
210pp.,
mus.
exx., photos, bibliog.,
index. ISBN 0-19-
816200-6 (cloth).
This book will be essential
reading
for all
those
considering
research in the field of
Chinese music. The book is
impressive
in its
breadth and
depth:
with a
breathtaking
bibliography largely
of Chinese sources, and
based on extensive fieldwork, it covers
regional genres
from the Northeast to
Guangdong
and inland to Shaanxi, with
introductory chapters
on social and
historical
background
and musical
analysis.
Several themes are
immediately apparent,
notably
Jones's
emphasis
on rural musical
traditions and dismissal of the conservatoire
style.
For students of Chinese music in
England today, this insistence on
"going
down to the
country"
is fast becoming
STEPHEN JONES, Folk music
of
China:
living
instrumental traditions. Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1995.
210pp.,
mus.
exx., photos, bibliog.,
index. ISBN 0-19-
816200-6 (cloth).
This book will be essential
reading
for all
those
considering
research in the field of
Chinese music. The book is
impressive
in its
breadth and
depth:
with a
breathtaking
bibliography largely
of Chinese sources, and
based on extensive fieldwork, it covers
regional genres
from the Northeast to
Guangdong
and inland to Shaanxi, with
introductory chapters
on social and
historical
background
and musical
analysis.
Several themes are
immediately apparent,
notably
Jones's
emphasis
on rural musical
traditions and dismissal of the conservatoire
style.
For students of Chinese music in
England today, this insistence on
"going
down to the
country"
is fast becoming
enshrined as "the
gospel according
to
Steve".
Though
his
critique
of the Chinese
conservatoires will doubtless cause offence
in some circles, the
point
is well worth re-
iterating.
Within China, anyone
who doubts
the low value
placed
on folk music
by
urban
musicians has
only
to listen to the disdain
with which
they pronounce
the words "folk
musician"
(minjian
yiren).
In the West, while
several excellent
recordings
of
"genuine"
Chinese folk music have
appeared
over the
last few
years,
still the artificial conservatoire
style
dominates the
general perception
of
Chinese music. While this remains the case,
the world is left
sadly ignorant
of a vast
body
of
glorious music, while the music
itself is devalued and further
impoverished.
Jones looks at the
problem
of
why
such a
gulf
lies between
professional
conservatoire
"folk music" and ritual traditions, tracing
the
impact
of nationalism and the move to
"dignify"
Chinese music back to the
early
twentieth
century.
This earlier
background
is
essential to
understanding
the
contemporary
situation, but is often
underplayed
in studies
of Chinese music which focus on the
impact
of the Communist
Party.
Moving
on to the communist era, Jones is
highly
critical of the new "national" music.
Perhaps
in this context the
point
made
by
David Holm (1991) is
apt,
the
tendency
of
Party
cadres to confuse "is" and
"ought
to
be": it was inconvenient, sometimes even
counter-revolutionary,
to reveal how it
really
was.
Consequently, genuine
music traditions
were
ignored
and often
suppressed
where
they
were linked to ritual; the new "folk
music" created in the conservatoires was
based on insufficient
understanding
of the
tradition and constituted a
strange
compromise
on what Chinese music
"ought"
to be.
"Ought"
became "is", and
the confusion carried over into the Western
understanding
of Chinese music.
I would seek to extend the debate to the
present day. Following
valuable work
by
musicologists
in the 1980s and 1990s, it
would seem that the conservatoire musicians
are
moving
towards a
greater understanding
of folk music, and more
interesting
use of
folk music in the art music field is
emerging.
One thinks of
avant-garde composers
like
Tan Dun and
perhaps Qu Xiaosong.
Of
course the most successful of these new
composers
are now
living
abroad: there is
little
support
for
avant-garde
music under
China's new market
economy.
enshrined as "the
gospel according
to
Steve".
Though
his
critique
of the Chinese
conservatoires will doubtless cause offence
in some circles, the
point
is well worth re-
iterating.
Within China, anyone
who doubts
the low value
placed
on folk music
by
urban
musicians has
only
to listen to the disdain
with which
they pronounce
the words "folk
musician"
(minjian
yiren).
In the West, while
several excellent
recordings
of
"genuine"
Chinese folk music have
appeared
over the
last few
years,
still the artificial conservatoire
style
dominates the
general perception
of
Chinese music. While this remains the case,
the world is left
sadly ignorant
of a vast
body
of
glorious music, while the music
itself is devalued and further
impoverished.
Jones looks at the
problem
of
why
such a
gulf
lies between
professional
conservatoire
"folk music" and ritual traditions, tracing
the
impact
of nationalism and the move to
"dignify"
Chinese music back to the
early
twentieth
century.
This earlier
background
is
essential to
understanding
the
contemporary
situation, but is often
underplayed
in studies
of Chinese music which focus on the
impact
of the Communist
Party.
Moving
on to the communist era, Jones is
highly
critical of the new "national" music.
Perhaps
in this context the
point
made
by
David Holm (1991) is
apt,
the
tendency
of
Party
cadres to confuse "is" and
"ought
to
be": it was inconvenient, sometimes even
counter-revolutionary,
to reveal how it
really
was.
Consequently, genuine
music traditions
were
ignored
and often
suppressed
where
they
were linked to ritual; the new "folk
music" created in the conservatoires was
based on insufficient
understanding
of the
tradition and constituted a
strange
compromise
on what Chinese music
"ought"
to be.
"Ought"
became "is", and
the confusion carried over into the Western
understanding
of Chinese music.
I would seek to extend the debate to the
present day. Following
valuable work
by
musicologists
in the 1980s and 1990s, it
would seem that the conservatoire musicians
are
moving
towards a
greater understanding
of folk music, and more
interesting
use of
folk music in the art music field is
emerging.
One thinks of
avant-garde composers
like
Tan Dun and
perhaps Qu Xiaosong.
Of
course the most successful of these new
composers
are now
living
abroad: there is
little
support
for
avant-garde
music under
China's new market
economy.
British Journal
of Ethnomusicology,
vol. 5
(1996)
Going
back to the
country,
Jones notes
how traditional
genres
are
today being
affected
by
new market forces, competition
from
pop
music and so forth; he traces the
progress
of
genres
that are able to
modify
and flourish, noting
which
genres
are unable
to
adapt
and survive.
Throughout,
the book
is
strongly
rooted in
history.
It is worthwhile
noting
that
many
of the instrumental
genres
that Jones looks at are
among
the most con-
servative, not to
say musically complex,
of
Chinese folk music,
and hence the most
endangered.
It is
perhaps
not fashionable
today
to bemoan the
dying
out of traditional
genres. Risking being
labelled "conser-
vative", Jones has
put
himself behind efforts
to revive and
support
some of these
genres,
efforts motivated
seemingly by
a
simple
belief in the value and
beauty
of the music.
Another welcome theme of the book is
the
emphasis
on the need for collaboration
in the field, which leads Jones to
present
a
comprehensive
introduction to the work of
Chinese
musicologists
since 1949. He is
clear about the limitations of Chinese
musicology,
in
particular
the lack of social
context in their studies, but
again asks, why
is this so? His
depiction
of the
political
constraints and
changing
lines that
they
have
had to contend with is drawn from
long
familiarity
with the
system;
the
metaphor
of
Chinese
musicology
as
"tightrope walking"
(144) sums
up
the situation
beautifully.
For
anyone
who still doubts the
political
nature
of
musicology,
China is an
object
lesson. Yet
in
spite
of this he
rightly praises
the
"remarkable achievements" of Chinese
musicologists, particularly during
the 1950s,
and looks forward to the
completion
of the
Anthology of
Chinese
folk music
(Zhongguo
minzu
minjian yinyue
jiceng),
the
huge
nationwide
project
to collate and
publish
transcriptions
of all folk music
genres,
ongoing
since the
early
1980s. Western
researchers in China cannot
operate
in
isolation.
The book is full of
elegant oppositions:
from the basic
polarity
of urban
professional
vs. rural, it moves on to the
question
of
unity
vs.
diversity
across
regional genres.
It
contrasts the considerable
degree
of cross-
fertilisation
historically
between
regions,
genres,
vocal and instrumental, literati and
folk music, with the distinctive "flavour"
(weidao)
of local traditions, and the local
emphasis
on insider
knowledge. Moving
further inside the music traditions, we find
the
polarities
of local terms and
concepts:
sitting
music
(zuoyue)
and
walking
music
(xingyue),
civil
(wen)
and martial (wu), etc.
Some of these emic terms are familiar, some
are new; they
are
particularly
welcome when
compared
and contrasted with the etic terms
created
by
Chinese
musicologists.
The
many
terms in
pinyin
are excellent, but a Chinese
character list would have been welcome.
The book is
strong
on contextualisation,
especially
on the ritual use of much of
village
music. There are also informative
sections on instrumentation and hetero-
phony;
nuclear melodies and
augmentation;
metrical and labelled
melody
form. His
explanation
of scales, keys
and modes is a
clear
analysis
of a
subject
often made
quite
impenetrable.
Musical
examples
in staff or
cipher
notation
provide
useful illustrations to
his
points; cipher
notation works success-
fully
for
comparative transcriptions,
while
the
complexity
of individual instrumental
interpretation
of nuclear melodies is best
portrayed
on the staff.
The themes introduced in the
general
chapters
are
picked up
in the
chapters
on
regional genres,
which are
extremely
wide-
ranging.
The
chapters
on the less well-
known music of North China will be
particularly
welcome to future researchers,
incorporating suggestions
for further
research. The book takes
slightly
different
approaches
to different
regions:
the
chapter
on
Jiangnan
for
example
follows the
highly
technical
analyses
of
shifan
luogu
made
by
Chinese
musicologists,
while other
chapters
concentrate more on social and historical
aspects.
Sections on southern
genres
seem
more familiar when
dealing
with
genres
already
treated in English
by,
for
example,
Thrasher and Witzleben (see References), but
also introduce
many
lesser-known
genres
of
the
regions.
There is a
fascinating
section on
political
and social
aspects
of Cantonese
music, including
the
impact
of
imperialism
and nationalism.
This is the first book to cover a broad
range
of Chinese music that moves
successfully
from the overview to the insider
view of folk music. On such a
huge subject,
it is
inevitably selective; Jones
suggests
that
more research is needed in the
poorer,
less
accessible inland areas, and on the relation-
ship
between Han and
minority
music in
China. It is a book made
possible by years
of fieldwork, collaboration with local
researchers and extensive
reading
in Chinese
169
170 British Journal
of Ethnomusicology,
vol. 5 (1996) 170 British Journal
of Ethnomusicology,
vol. 5 (1996)
musicology. Perhaps
the strongest
impression given by
the book is its
personal
touch, familiarity
with the music and the
people
and a
deep
sense of commitment to
them. The book is
complemented by
a
double CD set (see below; reviewed in BJE
4), with some beautiful recordings
both from
Jones's own collection and from the Music
Research Institute in
Beijing.
I was
particularly
taken with the "numinous"
1950s recording
of Buddhist music from
Zhihuasi temple.
Highly
recommended!
REFERENCES
Holm, David (1991) Art and
ideology
in
revolutionary
China. Oxford: Clarendon
Press.
Jones, Stephen (1995) China: folk
instru-
mental traditions. 2-CD set. VDE-Gallo
CD-822-823.
Thrasher, Alan
(1989)
"Structural continu-
ity
in Chinese sizhu: the baban model."
Asian Music 20.2: 67-106.
Witzleben, J. Lawrence (1995) "Silk and
Bamboo" music in
Shanghai:
the
Jiangnan
sizhu instrumental ensemble
tradition. Kent State Univ. Press.
RACHEL HARRIS
School of Oriental and African Studies
University of
London
rh@soas.ac.uk
musicology. Perhaps
the strongest
impression given by
the book is its
personal
touch, familiarity
with the music and the
people
and a
deep
sense of commitment to
them. The book is
complemented by
a
double CD set (see below; reviewed in BJE
4), with some beautiful recordings
both from
Jones's own collection and from the Music
Research Institute in
Beijing.
I was
particularly
taken with the "numinous"
1950s recording
of Buddhist music from
Zhihuasi temple.
Highly
recommended!
REFERENCES
Holm, David (1991) Art and
ideology
in
revolutionary
China. Oxford: Clarendon
Press.
Jones, Stephen (1995) China: folk
instru-
mental traditions. 2-CD set. VDE-Gallo
CD-822-823.
Thrasher, Alan
(1989)
"Structural continu-
ity
in Chinese sizhu: the baban model."
Asian Music 20.2: 67-106.
Witzleben, J. Lawrence (1995) "Silk and
Bamboo" music in
Shanghai:
the
Jiangnan
sizhu instrumental ensemble
tradition. Kent State Univ. Press.
RACHEL HARRIS
School of Oriental and African Studies
University of
London
rh@soas.ac.uk
BERNARD LRTAT-JAXR
Sardinian chron-
ickes.
Chicago/London:
Univ. of
Chicago
Press, 1995.
x+118pp., photos, index,
compact
disc. ISBN 0-226-49340-7
(cloth),
0-226-49341-5
(pb).
Transl. of
French
original, Chroniques
sardes
(Julliard, 1990).
An
intriguing
little book, this: at once
personal
and distant, revealing
and elusive,
full of
precise
detail and
yet leaving
us to
guess.
What were Bernard Lortat-Jacob's
intentions in
writing
it? He doesn't tell us
directly;
nor does
any specifying
subtitle
shed
light. Page
1 launches us onto the
ferry
to Sardinia; after the briefest of liminal
periods (one sentence), we are
among
Sardinians. On the last
page
we are with a
Sardinian travel
agent
as L-J
negotiates
a
ticket back to France.
In a
two-page Foreword, Michel Leiris
perhaps speaks
for the author: In a series of
BERNARD LRTAT-JAXR
Sardinian chron-
ickes.
Chicago/London:
Univ. of
Chicago
Press, 1995.
x+118pp., photos, index,
compact
disc. ISBN 0-226-49340-7
(cloth),
0-226-49341-5
(pb).
Transl. of
French
original, Chroniques
sardes
(Julliard, 1990).
An
intriguing
little book, this: at once
personal
and distant, revealing
and elusive,
full of
precise
detail and
yet leaving
us to
guess.
What were Bernard Lortat-Jacob's
intentions in
writing
it? He doesn't tell us
directly;
nor does
any specifying
subtitle
shed
light. Page
1 launches us onto the
ferry
to Sardinia; after the briefest of liminal
periods (one sentence), we are
among
Sardinians. On the last
page
we are with a
Sardinian travel
agent
as L-J
negotiates
a
ticket back to France.
In a
two-page Foreword, Michel Leiris
perhaps speaks
for the author: In a series of
"brief
vignettes"
L-J shares with us "his
interactions with all
[surely
not!
-
DWH]
those-musicians and others-whom he
needed for his
study
... flesh-and-blood
characters ... described in their
every
vital
dimension
[making]
the
lay
reader sense that
there do indeed exist human beings
called
'Sardinians"'. This is a fair
description.
L-J
has
given
us technical
insights
into Sardinian
music in other
publications;
here we
get
a
taste of the island itself, of its
people,
the
pace
of life, the contexts of music and dance,
the
style
of human interaction.
It also
gives
a
good
sense of what
fieldwork is like. This too is done without
explicit
intention and involves neither
theoretical musings
nor
practical sugges-
tions. (For
a true taste of the field, however,
stick with Malinowski's diaries or
Nigel
Barley.)
Each of us will find
passages
that
resonate. Much of his research had to be
conducted in bars, where one could not
avoid imbibing:
"I was slowly becoming
an
alcoholic [and learned] unfortunately
a bit
late that mineral water was on the list of
acceptable
drinks" (31).
This recalled,
painfully, Japan,
where the
only
excuses for
not
guzzling
alcohol were a doctor's
directive or a car (I
had neither);
the
conversations we had over drinks were
surely
among
the most
revealing
and valuable-if
only
I could remember them!
We meet a fascinating
cast of characters:
the launeddas maker who
struggled
to find
the 24
(sic)
notes in an octave but would
spend
hours
enraptured, listening
to "the
components
of a
single sound"; the
accordionist whose
attempts
to sell his
repertoire
and festival bookings
the
way
a
doctor sells his
practice
attracted amused
local scorn; the ancient church chorister
whose inventive ornamentation left his
choirmates lost for cues; the returned
dmigrd
who
longed
to
replace
the distinctive local
vocal
style
with bel canto "to return some
nobility
to Sardinian singing".
Amidst all this concrete detail, the author
does
assay
the occasional
generalisation,
for
example concerning
the islanders' "delight
in the
spoken
word ... a natural inclination
toward the
explicit" (39)-but
these are
often
seemingly
contradicted
by examples
elsewhere:
"Any
discussion of music and its
techniques
was
immediately
hurried over: ...
Pichiaddas would
grab
his accordion to
illustrate everything
and nothing" (13). But
"brief
vignettes"
L-J shares with us "his
interactions with all
[surely
not!
-
DWH]
those-musicians and others-whom he
needed for his
study
... flesh-and-blood
characters ... described in their
every
vital
dimension
[making]
the
lay
reader sense that
there do indeed exist human beings
called
'Sardinians"'. This is a fair
description.
L-J
has
given
us technical
insights
into Sardinian
music in other
publications;
here we
get
a
taste of the island itself, of its
people,
the
pace
of life, the contexts of music and dance,
the
style
of human interaction.
It also
gives
a
good
sense of what
fieldwork is like. This too is done without
explicit
intention and involves neither
theoretical musings
nor
practical sugges-
tions. (For
a true taste of the field, however,
stick with Malinowski's diaries or
Nigel
Barley.)
Each of us will find
passages
that
resonate. Much of his research had to be
conducted in bars, where one could not
avoid imbibing:
"I was slowly becoming
an
alcoholic [and learned] unfortunately
a bit
late that mineral water was on the list of
acceptable
drinks" (31).
This recalled,
painfully, Japan,
where the
only
excuses for
not
guzzling
alcohol were a doctor's
directive or a car (I
had neither);
the
conversations we had over drinks were
surely
among
the most
revealing
and valuable-if
only
I could remember them!
We meet a fascinating
cast of characters:
the launeddas maker who
struggled
to find
the 24
(sic)
notes in an octave but would
spend
hours
enraptured, listening
to "the
components
of a
single sound"; the
accordionist whose
attempts
to sell his
repertoire
and festival bookings
the
way
a
doctor sells his
practice
attracted amused
local scorn; the ancient church chorister
whose inventive ornamentation left his
choirmates lost for cues; the returned
dmigrd
who
longed
to
replace
the distinctive local
vocal
style
with bel canto "to return some
nobility
to Sardinian singing".
Amidst all this concrete detail, the author
does
assay
the occasional
generalisation,
for
example concerning
the islanders' "delight
in the
spoken
word ... a natural inclination
toward the
explicit" (39)-but
these are
often
seemingly
contradicted
by examples
elsewhere:
"Any
discussion of music and its
techniques
was
immediately
hurried over: ...
Pichiaddas would
grab
his accordion to
illustrate everything
and nothing" (13). But